Friday, March 16, 2007

Linux vendor Red Hat has announced the availability of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 (RHEL5), the latest version of the company's commercial Linux distribution. Featuring tightly integrated virtualization technology, broader hardware support, and improved interoperability, RHEL5 is the culmination of two years of focused development work undertaken in collaboration with the open source software community. In addition to conventional desktop and server editions, Red Hat plans to offer a small assortment of specialized RHEL5-based solutions designed for datacenters, database servers, and high-performance computing clusters.

With the release of RHEL5, Red Hat is also planning to launch a new open-source Internet marketplace called Red Hat Exchange (RHX) that will facilitate the deployment of commercial, third-party open-source applications on RHEL installations. RHX will allow consumers to buy software support services for third-party open-source technologies like MySQL database software and SugarCRM customer management systems directly from Red Hat. The company will provide first-tier support for software deployed through RHX via Cooperative Resolution Center. The strategic shift represented by Red Hat's new RHX service could give the company an edge in an increasingly competitive market for open-source services and support. Providing support for a wide variety of third-party products will require the company to significantly expand the scope of its support infrastructure and maintain close ties with numerous vendors.